Fast AHRS filter for accelerometer, magnetometer, and gyroscope combination with separated sensor corrections

Abstract

A new predictor–corrector filter for attitude and heading reference systems (AHRS) using data from an orthogonal sensor combination of three accelerometers, three magnetometers and three gyroscopes is proposed. The filter uses the predictor—corrector structure, with prediction based on gyroscopes and independent correction steps for acceleration and magnetic field sensors. We propose two variants of the filter: (i) one using mathematical operations of special orthogonal group SO(3), that are accurate for nonlinear operations, for highest possible accuracy, and (ii) one using linearization of nonlinear operations for fast evaluation. Both approaches are quaternion-based filter realizations without redundant steps. The filters are compared to state of the art methods in this field on data recorded using low-cost microelectromechanical systems (MEMS) sensors with ground truth measured by the VICON optical system. Both filters achieved better accuracy than conventional methods at lower computational cost. The recorded data with ground truth reference and the source codes of both filters are publicly available.